Graduation, Swimming and Hiking

The past nine days or so have been packed full of big activities for us. This blog post really ought to be written as at least three different posts, but I didn't ever take the time to sit down and blog, so now they are all going in as one. I have tons of pictures and won't add them all to this post but maybe I can upload them somewhere and post a link for anyone who wants to see them.

First off, Josh graduated with his PhD. I like to tease him now that he is Josh Price, PhD because we always laugh when people sign their names like that (you know-like they have to throw that part about having their PhD in there). While he actually got to walk across the stage and get handed a "diploma" (which was of course empty at this point) and wear the fancy robes with the hood and everything, he still has to finish writing his thesis, so he isn't done and he didn't feel all that excited to graduate. It was neat to see him walk across the stage though. He has also always wanted to wear the hood and be able to do this:

A few days after he graduated we went to the Wisconsin Dells for a little family vacation. We drove up Tuesday afternoon (it is about an hour from here) and stayed through Wednesday afternoon. The Dells are famous for waterparks (seems kind of funny in Wisconsin-not exactly where you would imagine a bunch of waterparks being). We stayed at a hotel called the Wildnerness that has three indoor waterparks and 3 or 4 outdoor ones. It wasn't warm enough to be outside and one of the indoor ones was closed but the boys didn't mind at all. We spent hours in the water and they were happy the whole time. Well, Nathan was happy the whole time anyway. Dallen mostly slept in his car seat near the pool (he did get in the water a little too though) and Jack went back and forth from the water to sitting all wrapped in his towel on the side. His favorite part was the "wazy wivah" (also sometimes called the Lazy River). We went with our friends the Dickmans which was especially fun. Nathan loved having his best friend Trey to go on the water slides with him. I was so proud of Nathan-he tried all of the big water slides and enjoyed them! That is a big step for him-in the past he hasn't liked having water anywhere near his face. This is the boys before we went down to the pools!

Yesterday we went on a really wonderful hike. I think it might be the most beautiful hike I have ever done! It was to a place called Parfrey's Glen about 45 minutes North of here (actually it is just south of the Dells). It was an easy little hike right along a river and then up into a gorgeous glen with rocks on either side of us and a little bridge to walk along and trees everywhere (and mud everywhere which Nathan slipped and fell in). The boys had a blast throwing rocks in the river and we even had a cold foot contest in honor of grandpa Allen (either one-mine or the boys' grandpa Allen since they both like to do it). We wish we had known about this beautiful place long ago not just two months before we leave here!

I forgot to mention we got to ride a ferry (in our minivan) to get to the place we were going! (See it behind the boys in this picture)

After our hike we took a nap and then went to BRAT Fest!!! We love the Madison tradition of brat fest. They cook up about 200,000 + Brats this weekend and everyone in Madison goes and buys them for cheap. They usually have the Weenie Mobile there and everything. We have gone every year that we have been here. It is a fun Madison tradition that we will miss. I love that everytime we go to it we see someone we know there. That is one of the things that I love about Madison in general. It has a real community feel and people are very involved and attend fun things like this.

So, it has been a busy and really fun week. Dallen started really laughing yesterday (took him long enough!) and he is maybe sort of sleeping a little better? He is such a doll and we are all in love with him! Oh and he rolled over for his first time while we were in our hotel room in the Dells!